Meg's Cirque Du Bebe

Party Recap

This has been my absolute favorite party to plan! The venue simply screamed circus with it's blue and white tented ceiling. My sister loved her shower and all the guests had a fabulous time. I hope you enjoy the photos!

Theme

Guests

Location

Date

26 February 2011

Idea

Party Highlights

Best Dressed

The mommy-to-be, of course, with her elephant pin :)

Desserts

. JDK Catering provided a mini-dessert assortment that consisted of mini éclairs, mini cheesecakes, and mini fruit tarts. Since every trip to the circus involves candy, we set up a mini candy buffet with strawberry-banana taffy, strawberry malted milk balls, and strawberry circus peanuts. We provided candy bags, so guests could take some for the ride home.
Wendi from SweeTreats (www.eatsweetreats.com) designed those delicious looking cupcakes and she was an absolute doll to work with. Guests could choose from chocolate cupcakes filled with raspberry with vanilla raspberry whipped topping and garnished with a raspberry or white chocolate tent or strawberries and cream cupcakes with a whipped topping and garnished with pink and yellow fondant elephants. We had almost double the amount of cupcakes than we did guests and every single cupcake was gone before guests started packing up their take home boxes.
The mommy-to-be got her very own circus tent cupcake that was a lemon cake with a blueberry bottom topped with a blueberry buttercream. She said when she got home her and hubby pulled out some forks and devoured almost the entire cake that night.

Activities / Games

To keep the guests entertained and bring out their competitiveness we played a trivia game about the mommy and daddy-to-be, a game we called "Sideshow" in which guests had to guess the parents of a "baby" celebrity we created on Morph Thing, Bingo while Megan opened her gifts, and a game in which guests passed a prize around the table based on a poem we read aloud (pass the box to the guest with the biggest boobs or the blondest hair, etc). We had some fabulous prizes for the winners, including a very cute apron and lovely hat.

Party Favors

Cotton candy, of course! After much searching we found a cotton candy company that made yellow and pink cotton candy (www.tastyclouds.com). Since we were aiming for a vintage feel we stuffed mason jars with cotton candy and packaged it in carriers along with handmade caramels from The Caramel Jar (thecarameljar.etsy.com). Guests also took home a cone of caramel popcorn.

Best Moment

Without a doubt the elephant seat! When we decided to go vintage circus, I set my heart on having my sister perch on an elephant while opening the gifts. One of my favorite circus memories is watching the parade of elephants with the prettiest, most glitzed out ladies riding on their backs. We had to have that. We couldn’t decide on how we were going to create this elephant, but then my mom found an elephant garden bench. An upside down garden planter to serve as the elephant stand, some pink and yellow spray paint, and we had our very own elephant parade.

What People Ate

We are firm believers that food should be directly related to the theme. Nothing against those who go the route of wraps and cheese trays for every event, but food can be so much more creative than that. When we think of the circus we think of pizza and hot dogs and French fries. That’s what we wanted on our menu…slightly jazzed up, of course. We worked with a great caterer, JDK Catering Group (www.jdkcatering.com). They helped us come up with a menu that was sure to be reminiscent of the circus.
Assorted Gourmet Mini Flatbread Pizzas
Margherita Flatbread Pizza
Mozzarella, Tomatoes, & Fresh Basil
Garlic & Herb Three Cheese Flatbread Pizza
With Alfredo Sauce
Hawaiian Paradise Flatbread Pizza
Topped with ham & fresh pineapple pieces
Mediterranean Flatbread Pizza
Mozzarella, Asiago, Parmesan, & Pecorino Cheeses
Tomatoes, Kalamata Olives, Roasted Red Bell Peppers, & Artichokes
Gourmet French Fries
Fresh cut French fries & sweet potato fries
Presented with marshmallow sauce, unique seasonings,
Chili, cheese, vinegar, ketchup & mustard
Gourmet Hot Dogs
With various toppings such as chili, cheese, sauerkraut, baked beans, finely chopped onions, bacon crumbles, coleslaw, relish, ketchup, mustard & gourmet roll
Creamy Macaroni & Cheese Balls
We provided guests with boxes to take home leftover desserts. Instead guests were packing up this food! I’ve never been to an event where guests take home more than just the dessert leftovers, but the food was seriously that good.

What People Drank

Punches served in mini milk bottles with paper straws.

Funniest Moment

The venue we worked with also offered to set up a photo booth. We signed up to include the booth, but had second thoughts because it was a bit pricey. We finally decided to just stick with it and hope it wasn’t too lame.
We were so happy we decided to stick with it. Guests loved cramming into that booth and having their photos taken. Looking back on those photos is hilarious! Each session included 2 strips of photos, one for the guests in the photos and the second strip to put in a scrapbook for the mommy-to-be.

The Centerpieces

We loved how these centerpieces reminded us of the headdresses the circus elephants and horses wear. Plus, my sister is all about feathers. Her centerpieces for her wedding were feathers, so we thought it was a nice way to incorporate another special day of her life.
We put the centerpieces together ourselves, but we rented the ostrich plumes and vases from SmileyMe.com. They shipped the centerpieces to us and we assembled them using their easy to follow instructions. After the shower was over, we packaged everything back up and sent them back. They then returned a portion of the rental price to us. Easy peasey and we don’t have to worry about what we’re going to do with 10 giant feather centerpieces now that the shower is over.

Decorations

The silhouette circus performers were one of the first details we decided upon. What is a circus without circus performers? When we first decided on the theme, I kept envisioning the ceiling of the venue and how it just screamed circus tent. The ceiling was huge, the event decorator said it wasn’t a problem to hang things from the ceiling and so we knew we had to take advantage of that. Using Etsy’s Alchemy, I put a call out for wooden silhouettes. David from Darbynwoods (http://www.facebook.com/darbynwoods) made all three silhouettes. However, the tightrope walker broke during shipping, so my dad made us a new one.
We also decided we had to have striped tent fabric. The venue was floor to ceiling windows and we thought it would be perfect to drape striped fabric around all the windows to mimic the opening of a circus tent. Finding that fabric was not easy, but there was no way we could have a circus themed shower without a proper circus tent.

Hand

Party Helpers

Terry @ PicToon Cards

Graphic Designer

Aren’t the invites gorgeous?! I’m going to do some shameless advertising here because the lady who made those did a phenomenal job at creating our vision.
Normally, we make our own invites. However, when I brought up the idea of pop-up invites my mom looked at me and said, “Don’t even think about suggesting that we make 75 pop-up invitations in two weeks.” (Because we had changed our theme at the last minute we were getting incredibly pressed for time.) So we turned to Etsy. At the time Alchemy was still going strong and I put up an ad letting all the creators know what I was looking for.
I received several responses, but Terry from Pictoon Cards (pictooncards.etsy.com) sent me a mock up and it was exactly what we wanted. How she managed to figure out my crappy sketch, I’ll never know, but she did it and it was perfect. We couldn’t have been more thrilled with the invitations. Plus, she had super speed turnaround time. (And her prices are to die for. My jaw hit the table when she quoted us a price, it was so affordable.)

JDK Catering Group

David @ Darbynwoods

Lauxmont Farms

4 comments

Wow, You are one heck of a sister! I'm sure you are going to be a very special Auntie too. Be sure to post Baby's 1st birthday party. I bet it's going to be amazing!

Nov 21, 2011

Dorie G
wrote:

I love the game! Do you have the answers? There were a few we couldn't figure out.

Aug 27, 2012

Nikki S
wrote:

Thanks, Dorie :)
The answers for the Sideshow game are:
1. Harrison Ford & Chewbacca
2. Oliva Newton-John and John Travolta
3. Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze
4. Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger
5. Julia Roberts and Richard Gere
6. Anthony Hopkins and Jody Foster
7. Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks
8. Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore
9. Hugh Grant and Sandra Bullock
10. Molly Ringwald and Judd Nelson
11. Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams
12. Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston
Along with the clues, we also had a poster board with photos of the celebs that we morphed into babies. I wish I had a photo of that, but I forgot to take one. This was definitely my favorite game!